Wednesday, December 05, 2007

Some thoughts on Advent

First, as I mentioned in my previous post, I added an Advent wreath to the blog in honor of the season. I failed, however, to mention where I got the wreath. Through another Catholic blog I was pointed to The Curt Jester who provided the Advent wreath for any blog. So thanks to the Curt Jester for the wonderful Advent wreath!!

Second, I have noticed a lot of talk this year about the importance of Advent. Along with this there is a lot of talk about how tired people are of the commercialization of Christmas and everyone's amazement of how early it starts. I saw Christmas stuff out along with the Halloween stuff during "Back to School" shopping. It is crazy!! I am hearing on the radio and reading on blogs about how people want to take back Christmas, away from the retailers, and bring it back to what it is really about--the birth of Jesus Christ, our Savior and our King.

Our Christmas stuff went up this past weekend. It still seems too early to me and I am considering some different things for next year. But convincing my husband will be interesting. This was a topic on many blogs who participated in this week's Catholic Carnival. Check it out here: Catholic Carnival 148: For Life.

Two of my favorite postings in this week's Carnival have to do exactly with the idea of recognizing the season of Advent, things to do during Advent, and placing Christmas properly where it belongs. These posts are great!! Go read them. The first is at the blog Catholic Fire called: Ten Tips to a Better Advent Season. The second is from A Catholic Mom Climbing the Pillars and she presents a beautiful view of the holidays from the end of Thanksgiving all the way to Epiphany in January. Check out her post What Would Celebrating Christmas correctly look like?. Her view is exactly what I have been looking for. So I'm getting ideas for next year and I love it!

Those are just two of my favorites from the Carnival. If you like those, go check out the others as well. I highly recommend them!

3 comments:

  1. I will admit that I have not read all of the links within this post, but I just wanted to put my thoughts on Christmas.

    Total agree that the commercialization of Christmas has taken over and the start of Christmas season is way too early.

    I feel that the day after Thanksgiving is plenty early to start decorating and preparing for the holiday season and Advent is a wonderful way to prepare ourselves for the special day of Christmas.

    PS I love Christmas and decorations should be up no later than Dec 11, no particular reason :-)

    Though I do like ideas of putting the nativity scene together as time unfolds. Baby Jesus arrives on Christmas Day, the Shepherds arrive at a latter time, etc. Which leads to the continuation of the Christmas season after Christmas.

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  2. After Christmas shouldn't be a continuation of Christmas. The Christmas season begins on Christmas day. In the Catholic Church our calendar is broken up into a variety of seasons. The year begins with the first Sunday of Advent. Traditionally the Advent season is a time of fasting, preparation, and sacrifice. Then Christmas Day gets here and the Christmas season begins. It lasts until Epiphany, usually 12 days, thus the song the "Twelve Days of Christmas."

    I'm not saying that no Christmas decorations should go up before Christmas, but we should try to recognize the Advent season a bit more.

    Hmmm ... Dec 11 for decorations? What could that reason be?! :)

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